From Infection to Immunotherapy: Host Immune Responses to Bacteria at the Bladder Mucosa The pathogenesis of urinary tract infection and mechanisms of the protective effect of Bacillus Calmette-Guerin therapy for bladder cancer highlight the importance of studying the bladder as a unique mucosal surface. Innate responses to bacteria are reviewed, and although the collective knowledge remains incomplete, the authors discuss how adaptive immunity may be generated following bacterial challenge in the bladder microenvironment. [Mucosal Immunol]Abstract

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Better, Faster Lab Reports Help States’ Outbreak Response Once labs detect dangerous infections, it’s crucial for the correct information to get to health departments quickly and in a format that allows them to recognize disease outbreaks. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s efforts to speed this process and ensure that the best and most complete information about disease cases is reported is paying off, according to new data released in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention]Press Release

US Government Shuts Down The US government entered a state of suspended animation on 1 October after Congress failed to agree on a budget for the next fiscal year, causing federal agencies – including those overseeing science policy and research – to shut down indefinitely. Most government scientists were ordered to stay at home, their offices and labs closed or run by a skeleton staff of ‘essential’ workers. The National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation stopped processing grants, some government websites were made inaccessible and many important research programmes were left hanging, potentially putting lives at risk in the case of some disease studies. [Nature Magazine]Editorial